A Randomised Controlled Trial to Evaluate Adding Self-administered Oral HIV testing as a Choice in Clinic and Non-clinic Settings to Increase HIV Testing Uptake Among Truck Drivers in Kenya.

This project is a randomized controlled trial to evaluate HIV test uptake among truck drivers recruited from two roadside wellness clinics in Kenya when offered a choice between the standard, clinic based, provider administered blood based rapid HIV test versus a choice between the standard HIV test or self-administered oral rapid HIV test that can be used in the clinic with supervision or outside the clinic without supervision.

This study looks at whether advertising self-administered oral HIV test kits to truck drivers and sex workers registered in the North Star alliance electronic medical record system increases HIV testing compared to the standard of texting general HIV testing reminders.

A Social Ecological Model of Infant Sleep Environments among Non-Hispanic Black Infants

This R15 aims to use photo-elicitation interviewing as a form of participatory research in low income urban communities to explore the lived experience of parenting and contextualize infant care practices among three non-Hispanic Black subgroups, and to quantitatively identify socio-cultural and environmental influences on sleep related infant care practices in these communities using audio computer assisted self- interviews to contribute to a social ecological model of infant sleep environments.

Accessible Care

Funded by: NIH/NIDA

This study will examine the feasibility, acceptability, safety, effectiveness, and cost of an Accessible Care intervention for engaging people who inject illicit drugs in Hepatitis C (HCV) care. Four times as prevalent in the US as HIV infection, HCV is already the leading cause of liver failure and liver transplantation, the disease burden and health care costs will continue to rise in the coming decades, and the 1.5-2.0 million people who inject illicit drugs (PWID) are the most severely affected. Accessible Care for PWID is low-threshold care provided in programs designed specifically for PWID, in community-based locations where they can comfortably access care without fear of shame or stigma. The proposed study will compare the effectiveness of Accessible Care with Usual Care (referrals to existing services) in facilitating linkage, engagement, and retention of PWID in care for hepatitis C, addiction, and HIV prevention. Our primary outcome is sustained virologic response (SVR), which constitutes virologic cure.

The major goal of Dr. Waldron’s U.S. Fulbright grant to Italy was to bridge gaps between high-throughput biology and public health, and bring together the University of Trento and CUNY on topics of common interest. Dr. Waldron completed his Fulbright grant January - June 2016.

Cancer genomics: integrative and scalable solutions in R/Bioconductor

The major goals of this project are to develop scalable R / Bioconductor software infrastructure and data resources to integrate complex, heterogeneous, and large cancer genomic experiments. The falling cost of genomic assays facilitates collection of multiple data types (e.g., gene and transcript expression, structural variation, copy number, methylation, and microRNA data) from a set of clinical specimens. Furthermore, substantial resources are now available from large consortium activities like The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA). Existing analysis pipelines focus on the treatment of a specific data type, leaving a critical need for tools for integrative analysis of multiple genomic assays for locally generated or publicly available data. This proposal adapts R / Bioconductor to meet the increasing conceptual and computational complexity of multi-assay cancer genomic experiments. PMID: 26463000, 25633503

The CA-IeDEA network includes 15 partners in Burundi, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and Rwanda, who are utilizing implementation science to identify effective strategies for optimizing HIV care outcomes, including timely diagnosis and care enrollment, care retention, ART initiation and viral suppression. CA-IeDEA partners are also conducting clinical epidemiologic investigations of co-morbidities among people living with HIV , including non-communicable chronic diseases, and mental health and substance use disorders. Members of the CA-IeDEA team also lead and contribute to multi-regional IeDEA projects, and maintain updated population-based data from various sources for use in examining contextual determinants of HIV outcomes.

Club Drug Use and PrEP Adherence in Vulnerable Men

This study investigates the association between club drug use (ketamine, ecstasy, GHB, cocaine, methamphetamine) and adherence to PrEP in a sample of 100 gay and bisexual men. Participants complete prospective and retrospective assessment.

Collaboration on HIV and Aging Research – Hudson Valley

Dr. Baim-Lance leads the research component for the Collaboration on HIV and Aging Research-Hudson Valley (CAHAR-HV). CAHAR-HV is made up of a diverse group of stakeholders of patients, providers, government agencies and researchers, working together to develop projects that improve the care for older individuals with HIV. CAHAR-HV is in the process of developing feasible, scaled-up implementation science studies on issues pertinent to HIV and aging using community-based, participatory research methods. CAHAR-HV is supported with a Pipeline to Proposal Award from the Patient Center Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI).

There is a consensus in the literature that provider – generally hospital – concentration causes higher commercial medical prices. Newer literature has examined the supply side of the market to examine whether concentrated insurers successfully lower premiums. But there is almost no research connecting these two literatures, investigating the combined dynamics of provider and insurer concentration on costs and premiums. This project investigates whether the association of provider market concentration and hospital costs and insurance premiums differs by insurance market competitiveness.